Other Voices

Runaway Champerty

You may not know what it is, but it deserves to be taxed

PUNITIVE DAMAGES ARE spiraling out of control, threatening our economy, our democracy and our freedom. A recent case, Exxon vs. Alabama, produced an Alabama jury award of nearly $12 billion in punitive damages, or roughly $2,600 for every person in Alabama, for a claim that the company had underpaid the state by $63 million for natural-gas drilling rights, a matter of $14 for each Alabaman. It ought to shock us with its breathtaking greed, Though perhaps we can take some small comfort from a judge's reducing the sentence to $3.5...